DU’s J-Mart fixes hip in Vail (UPDATE with quotes)

DU sophomore center Jesse Martin had hip surgery last week in Vail, following Alex Rodriguez out the door of Dr. Marc Philippon’s office at the Steadman-Hawkins Clinic.

J-Mart apparently played all of last season and parts of his freshman campaign in significant pain. He had 23 points (10 goals) in 37 games last season and has 38 points in 78 career games.

The hard-nosed Canadian never complained, never even mentioned his injury. But make no mistake, with a fixed hip by the renowned Dr. Philippon, who is the NHL Players Association orthopedic surgeon, the Pioneers undoubtedly will see the best of Martin next season. He and senior-to-be Tyler Ruesgegger were the team’s top two centers for most of 2008-09.

“This was probably my fourth year with this injury,” Martin told me Monday. “It’s gotten better and then worse, back and forth. People told me I had a bad groin, bad hip-flexor and some other things. This year it never got better and they discovered this at the start of the year. It was huge relieve to have somebody know exactly what it was.”

Martin defined the injury as a torn labrum. He already is riding a stationary bike and is expected to be at full strength within 3-4 months, well before the October season opener.

“It was a length surgery but pretty successful. I think they were real happy with it,” Martin said. “It’s nice to not have something like this in the back of your mind . . . It will hopefully improve my stride, eliminate the pain and soreness, and I won’t have to always wonder how it’s going to feel when I wake up in the morning.”

Dr. Philippon operated on Rodriguez’s hip this spring and previously worked on Paul Kariya and Mario Lemieux, among others.

Amazing that Martin was as effective as he was this season. Can`t wait to see him play when that pain is gone.

JLSinGJ

Amazing that Martin was as effective as he was this season. Can`t wait to see him play when that pain is gone.

Cross-Czech

Thanks for the update. It will be fun to watch him play with his hip fixed. He had a very solid sophmore year with nice progress from his freshman year. We’re probably going to see just as much improvement, if not more, from his sophmore year.

Cross-Czech

Thanks for the update. It will be fun to watch him play with his hip fixed. He had a very solid sophmore year with nice progress from his freshman year. We’re probably going to see just as much improvement, if not more, from his sophmore year.

Sherry

Jesse was my favorite player this season. I had no idea he was in pain. This is SO exciting. He’s such a hard worker – it will be a blast seeing him at 100%!

Sherry

Jesse was my favorite player this season. I had no idea he was in pain. This is SO exciting. He’s such a hard worker – it will be a blast seeing him at 100%!